Devices used primarily to provide transportation to mobility impaired people have been available for many years. The mobility devices include wheelchairs, transport chairs and walkers. Wheelchairs are generally self-propelled, motorized or pushed by a second person. Walkers are propelled by the user. Many of these devices are collapsible for transport or storage and some walkers are convertible into transport chairs (also called “transport wheelchairs”). A transport chair is a chair designed for its occupant to be propelled by another person. Transport chairs do not have the large wheel characteristic of a wheelchair but rely upon a set of four smaller wheels. The front two wheels of transport and wheelchairs are commonly of the “caster” type.
The difficulty with existing mobility devices is that they provide only limited convenience to a mobility impaired traveler who requires baggage transportability plus the ability to collapse for easy hand transport. A graphic example of the deficiency of existing devices can be witnessed watching a couple traveling through an airport with the caregiver pushing an airport-supplied wheelchair while trying to hold onto their luggage with the passenger pushing a wheeled walker with more baggage stacked on the walker seat. This Apparatus was designed under the premise that a mobility-impaired person and her/his caregiver should be able to travel most anywhere including an airport, train station, hotel or town square. In order to do this the apparatus needs to be able to carry a substantial amount of baggage, be constructed of suitable materials and collapse quickly for storage or transportation in an aircraft, train or automobile trunk. In addition, it should be able to travel over uneven pavement or gravel in a parking lot.
Examples of prior art include a foldable wheelchair (U.S. Pat. No. 5,560,636 A), a collapsible transport chair (U.S. Ser. No. 11/728,782), a convertible walker (U.S. Ser. No. 13/815,255), a commercial luggage capable non-collapsable transport chair (US20030090073 A1) and a wheelchair with luggage transporter (U.S. Pat. No. 4,902,029 A)